Ragnchild

The tourist season has really started over here in Norway, and I am just as surprised each year by how interesting the tourists find this country. Sometimes it’s quite incredible what they are fascinated by, they buy t-shirts with stupid drawings of elks on them and woolen sweaters in the middle of summer, I even saw one tourist taking a photo of a manhole cover. Still, when you are new to a country, it is perhaps logical that it seems more interesting than if you have lived there your whole life. Now, since most of the people reading this post are not from Norway, I thought that it would be interesting to present some (random) facts about Norway. Here we go:

Cheese slicer, the Norwegian specialty
Yes, this interesting little artifact was actually invented in Norway, and is still used frequently today, it also fits very well with the famous Norwegian brown cheese. My theory is that it was invented because food is expensive in Norway and so people wanted to make thin slices, but that’s a another matter. Continue reading Norway in a nutshell

Hurray, the holidays are here! After three years of High school, it feels really weird to be finished, I’ve been waiting for this so long and then in an instant it’s over. Suddenly I find myself standing before an ocean of free time, and I can’t wait to dive into it. One thing that I find interesting is how quickly your daily routine can change during a holiday. During a revision period, I would be thrilled to have an evening without homework, whereas now I can sleep for 10 hours and be lazy all day without thinking about it. It’ll be weird not to have that voice in my head that says “shouldn’t you be doing some more homework?” all the time. What I look forward to the most is that now I can do the things I usually don’t have time for, like watching lots of episodes of my favourite TV-shows, work on my design and coding skills, practice violin properly etc. The only thing I don’t like about this holiday is that I don’t have a job, which would be nice to have, and since many of my friends are working I feel a bit left out. Continue reading Hello holidays, good bye homework

Yes, I know this might be a rather unusual blog subject, but it’s something that I find important. Today is World Blood Donor Day, which is a global celebration of voluntary blood donors, and also a day for creating awareness of the importance of donating blood. Many people have a desire to help others, but it’s often hard to find the right opportunity. Well, this is your chance. Most healthy people can give blood, and it’s a really great way of helping others. It really does not cost you anything at all, since your body replaces the blood you donate, and you also get your blood checked for various things, including hemoglobin levels, which can be practical. Continue reading World Blood Donor Day

Normally, when you think about language, you see it as a way of expressing yourself. You can say that your personality helps decide what kind of language you use. Thinking of this, have you ever considered that it might work the other way around as well? What if the language you speak affects the way you think and behave? Since I’m a multilingual person, this is a question I find quite interesting. When I think about it, I do feel different when I talk in Norwegian than when I talk in English or German. When I hear someone speak German, for example, I often get this good feeling. This is probably due to the fact that I associate German with summer holiday and my grand parents.

There is some evidence that when bilinguals switch between languages, their personality changes. This is something that I personally believe is true to some extent, because I have experienced it in my everyday life. It also seems logical, since language is strongly related to culture, that when speaking another language you might associate differently and thus express different sides of your personality. Continue reading Can language affect behaviour?

Finally, summer has come to what seemed like the land of endless cold. It’s been warm and sunny for a week now, and I even went swimming outside today for the first time this year. What I love most about summer though is the air, it just feels and smells totally different, and it’s like you can breathe in a totally different way. I’ve been taking some lovely walks around our local lake, and since my camera decided to work after all, I took some photos which you can view here. The ducks were very sweet, I was able to get really close to them, and after a while they even started following me. That was quite funny, as I imagined coming home followed by a pack of ducks, but they lost interest when they discovered that I didn’t have any food. Later I discovered some adorable ducklings swimming around on the lake, I need to get a picture of those as well. Continue reading Summer is here

This may sound shocking to some of you, but I actually believe that people who make their living out of singing (i.e. pop stars), should actually be able to sing considerably better than the average person. This is why I get thoroughly irritated when I observe what kind of people get fame and fortune from singing hideous songs with a voice that can at best be qualified as mediocre. Yes, I understand that these days a good singing voice isn’t everything, but it makes me wonder why not every person with charisma and good looks gets to be a pop star. Continue reading Do they even have a talent?